Ken Caminiti, former baseball player and the 1996 National League MVP, passed away from a heart attack at the age of 41. Though the medical report has not been released, Caminiti’s admitted usage of cocaine and steroids is suggested to be part of the cause. In light of the ongoing BALCO investigation surrounding athletes, several of them high profile baseball players, the death is a sobering reminder of the dangerous brand of chemistry that athletes play to gain an edge on the playing field. Though tragic for a man to die so young, there are important lessons to take away from his death, specifically in regards to how and why players are accused of taking steroids.

Caminiti’s greatest season took place in 1996 when he led the Padres to the World Series and was rewarded with the NL MVP award. His stat line for the year read .326/40/130, all career highs and the only time in his 15 year career that he had over 30 homeruns and 100 runs batted in. Combined with great fielding prowess and a fiery demeanor most fans viewed it as a player being in “the zone” and taking a team on his shoulders for season. Since hindsight is always 20/20 we later realized his “zone” was artificially induced. However, in light of his career numbers up to that point, it can be said that anyone who didn’t question his fetes was suffering from naivety. For a player to never hit more than 30 HR’s in a season to explode for 40 the next year, and then never crack 30 again should raise a red flag. Speculating on which players are or are not on the juice has always been a touchy subject, however, in light of Caminiti’s death, it needs to be addressed.

First you need to look at the career and stats of the player in question. The two most prominent names at the moment in the BALCO investigation are Barry Bonds and Gary Sheffield. However both men have long been power hitters and all around greats so you have to wonder where is the benefit to take steroids. They are great players; there is not much more room to move up. Conversely, for marginal to average players, the temptation to make that leap can prove to be too much to ignore. From the years I’ve watched baseball, two men jump out as likely candidates for taking steroids, Brady Anderson and Bret Boone. The exploration of their statistics and the branding of them as possible steroid users is not to shame them, but instead head warning to them to be aware of the medical risks later in life.

Brady Anderson has long been rumored to having took steroids. In this instance, there is one reason for the speculation. The 1996 season coincidentally enough, Brady Anderson exploded for 50 homeruns for the Baltimore Orioles. His previous career high was 21 and he never hit more than 24 in a season after that. How can you explain that? How does a lanky leadoff hitter with average power hit 50 in a season, and never hit more than 25 in a year after that? It doesn’t add up. Additionally, following his big year, he began to break down physically, playing only 5 seasons until later retiring. You can’t help but wonder what was going on during that magical season.

For the first 5 seasons of Bret Boone’s career he was a good player with moderate power, then seemingly out of nowhere he becomes a monster mashing power machine with the Seattle Mariners. The skinny second basemen of the Reds and Padres is now a muscled up Mack truck who strikes fear into the heart of pitchers. Now you may say that story sounds very familiar to Barry Bonds who went from being a string bean to the mountain of muscle he is today. But when you take into account that in the first 7 full seasons of his career Boone never hit more than 25 HR’s and Bonds was AVERAGING 25 homeruns a year through his first seven years you can see a major difference. Bonds was a power hitter who developed more power. Boone was a contact hitter with moderate power who became a power slugger seemingly overnight. Additionally, Bonds has remained injury free for the majority of his career whereas Boone missed a lot of time this year with nagging injuries. Injuries that followed the most prolific three-year stretch of power over his entire career.

The bottom line is that a man has passed away and the question is whether or not the steroids he took was part of the cause. Maybe if people had caught the signs earlier they could have prevented his destructive behavior. The suspicion of other players who may have done the same thing is needed for two reasons. One is to force everyone to look closer at what a player is doing and how they are doing it, but also to prevent the persecution of other ballplayers who don’t deserve the scrutiny.